I guess we both hoped to have the compartment for ourselves. But even the seating carriage on that NightJet to La Spezia was almost booked out, not to mention the actual sleeping carriages. We both knew that a rather sleepless night was ahead, given the limited comfort of the seats. I am not sure how the conversation started, but it got deep very quickly. We talked about many things. About traveling. About work culture. About meditation. About life. While the situation may sound like the cheesy start of a romantic movie, it was not, and that was the beauty of it. Across me sat a guy of my age. No romantic interest whatsoever. It was the perfect example of a yellow soul, as in Albert Espinosa's The Yellow World, who had popped up out of the blue and would disappear to nowhere. An interaction with no hidden (or not so hidden) agenda. No romantic, economic, political, or religious intention behind it. A real conversation with a stranger. Unfortunately, a rare event.

The final destination was Roma Termini, with a change to a high speed train in Padova